mouth was gluey; she felt dried out. Not surprising. It had been a manic forty-eight hours. A long evening at the office making sure that everything was covered while she was away. A quick meeting with the bride, a scramble to pack and get to the airport. And she’d spent most of her time on the plane getting to grips with ‘the design’, making sure she was on top of everything that had to be done.
‘There’s water if you need it,’ he said, nodding towards a bottle, dewed with moisture, that was standing on the table between them.
‘Thanks.’
She took a long drink, then found the stick of her favourite strawberry-flavoured lip balm she always kept in her pocket.
‘What was I saying?’ she asked.
‘That you’d slept in worse places than David’s office.’
She paused in the act of uncapping the stick, suddenly chilled despite the hot sun filtering through the trees as she remembered those places. The remand cell. The six long months while she was locked up. The hostel…
She slowly wound up the balm, taking her time about applying it to her lips. Taking another long pull on the water while she tried to recall the conversation that had led up to that.
The shortage of rooms. The wretched bridesmaid and the equally annoying best man. That was it. She’d been telling him about the need for yet another room. And she had told him that she’d sleep in the office if necessary…
After that she didn’t remember anything.
Weird…
She stopped worrying about it—it would all come back to her—and, in an attempt to make a joke of it, she said, ‘You won’t tell David I said that, will you? About sleeping on his office floor. I don’t want to give him an excuse to give up trying to find somewhere.’
‘I won’t,’ Gideon assured her. ‘Not that it matters. David won’t let you sleep in his office. Not if he values his job.’
‘His job?’ She frowned. ‘Are you saying that you’d fire him? When you’re one of the reasons we’re in this mess?’
‘There are health, safety, insurance considerations,’ he said. ‘You’re a guest. If anything were to happen to you while you were bedded down on the office floor, you’d sue the pants off me.’
‘Too right.’ She’d considered denying it, but clearly it wasn’t going to make any difference what she said. ‘The pants, the shirt and everything else. Better leave now,’ she urged him. Then, just to remind him that he owed her a favour, ‘Did you enjoy your lunch?’
‘Yes, thanks. Your sacrifice was appreciated.’
Sacrifice? Didn’t he know that city girls lived on steamed fish and a mouthful of salad if they wanted to keep their figures? At least when they were being good. She could eat a pizza right now, but the fish would do and she turned to the tray. It wasn’t there. There was nothing but the bottle of water.
‘What happened to my lunch?’ she asked.
‘Room service cleared it hours ago.’
‘Excuse me?’ She glanced at her watch, frowned. It showed a quarter past four. Had she made a mistake when she’d moved it forward?
‘You’ve been asleep for nearly three hours, Josie.’
‘Pull the other one…I just closed my eyes,’ she protested.
‘At about half past one,’ he agreed. ‘And now you’ve opened them.’
At quarter past four? No…She looked around, desperately hoping for some way to deny his claim.
The sun had been high overhead when she’d joined Gideon for lunch. The light seemed softer, mellower now and, looking up to check how far it had moved, she realised that someone had placed a shade over her.
‘Where did that come from?’ she asked, startled. Then, still not quite able to believe it, ‘I’ve really been asleep?’ She could have sworn she’d simply closed her eyes and then opened them a moment later. It had felt like no more than a blink. ‘Why didn’t you wake me?’
‘Why would I do that?’ he asked. ‘You obviously needed a nap.’
‘Three hours isn’t a nap!’ she said, telling leaden limbs to move, limbs that appeared to be glued to the lounger. ‘There’ll be emails. Messages. I have to talk to the chef. Unpack the linen and check that everything’s there. That it’s the right colour,’ she continued in a rush of panic, forcing her legs over the edge. ‘I’ve got a hundred favour boxes to put together.’
‘Relax, Josie. No one rushes around in the afternoon heat. Take your cue from the animals.’
‘And do what?’ she demanded. ‘Slosh about in the river?’
‘Not in the afternoon. That’s when they find a cool corner in the shade, lie down and go to sleep.’
‘Check,’ she said. ‘Done that.’
‘So has everyone else with any sense. Including the chef.’ He grinned. ‘Now is the time to take a dip.’
She glanced towards the wide oxbow lake that had been formed by the erosion of the bank where the river had once formed a great loop. Animals had begun to gather at the water’s edge. Small deer, a couple of zebras and then, as she watched, a giraffe moved majestically towards the water and a lump caught in her throat.
This was real. Not a zoo or a safari park or David Attenborough on the telly and she watched transfixed for a moment before remembering that she had work to do and, turning back to Gideon, said, ‘Actually, bearing in mind your advice about crocodiles, I think I might give that one a miss.’
‘What do you think the plunge pool is for?’
‘Oh, I know that one…“You can simply sit in your own private plunge pool and watch elephants cavorting below you in an oxbow lake while you sip a glass of chilled bubbly,”’ she quoted, trying not to think about how good that sounded right now. ‘I’ve read the guidebook.’ Or, rather, had it read to her.
‘Sounds good to me.’ He began to unbutton his shirt to reveal a broad tanned chest with a delicious sprinkling of dark chest hair. ‘Get your kit off and I’ll ring for room service.’
Jolted from her distracted gaze, she said, ‘Excuse me?’
‘You’re the one who suggested water therapy. I wasn’t convinced but the champagne sold it to me.’
Josie was hot, dehydrated and a little water therapy—the delicious combination of cool water, hot skin and the best-looking man she’d met in a very long time—was much too tempting for a woman who hadn’t had a date in a very long time.
It was in the nature of the job that events planners were working when other people were partying.
And part of the appeal.
She didn’t have to think about why she didn’t have a social life when she was too busy arranging
